


Couples Counselling in the Nine Realms

by arysteia



Category: Avengers (Comics), Avengers Prime (Comics)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-11
Updated: 2014-04-11
Packaged: 2018-01-17 15:56:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1393603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arysteia/pseuds/arysteia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes elves, orcs, ogres, goblins, a dragon, the Nine Realms converging, and an epic battle are what it takes to reconcile following a Civil War.  Oh, and a little bit of honesty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Couples Counselling in the Nine Realms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LePeru (Nizah)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nizah/gifts).



> Dear LePeru,
> 
> It was a hard row to hoe, taking such an inherently cracky episode and trying to thrash out some serious issues with it, but I hope the medium I found is a happy one and that it meets as much of your request as possible.
> 
> Thanks to Hazel for audiencing.

If Tony wasn’t so wedded to his role as an over-confident, charming but arrogant, know all incapable of taking advice, it would be easier for Steve to break out of his own part in this tragedy turned farce, forever typecast as a sanctimonious, decent but pompous, know all incapable of not criticising. Instead, they keep hitting their cues perfectly, and repeating the lines they know by heart from playing this scene, or a variation of it, so many times before. All around them the shattered remnants of Asgard crumble and slide to dust, and Thor, their best and oldest friend, wanders the ruins of his home looking like he wants to lie down among them and never get up.

“Anything can be rebuilt,” Tony says, his voice coldly modulated through the suit and lacking the emotive cues that might make what he’s saying encouragement or comfort rather than disinterested observation. “I’ve restarted the company a million times. And the armour gets better every time.”

Thor’s father and brother are dead though, the latter after looking at the devastation he’d wrought, his life’s dream come to fruition, and inexplicably changing his mind, and Steve knows better than anyone that you never love home so much as when you realise you can’t go back there, or a loved one so dearly as when you’ll never see them again and can never put right your wrongs. It’s just a _little_ different from upgrading your latest expensive toy.

Especially since Steve’s still half convinced Tony’s constant tinkering with the Extremis and his own genetic code helped make him into the cold-hearted bastard who could toss _kids _into the Negative Zone. A computer for a brain and a reactor for a heart, and all the baggage that goes along with that, is easier to deal with than the thought that maybe Tony Stark just isn’t the man Steve always thought he was.__

“Seriously, wait until you see the new suit I’m working on,” Tony goes on.

Steve has known Tony forever, from the moment he woke up in this new century, flat on his back on the deck of an Arctic trawler, blinking up at the cast of a Flash Gordon serial leaning over him, complete with what he thought was a robot, who unmasked to reveal an Errol Flynn style matinee idol. He knows exactly what to say to cut the deepest.

“I haven’t decided yet whether I’m going to let you keep the armour, _Iron Man_ ,” he says, without taking his eyes off the fire raging through what was once the throne room. “I’m not sure it’s in the best interests of the country. Or the planet, come to that.”

“Is that right?” Tony asks, and even through the helmet he sounds angry. Or is he hurt? Steve used to be able to tell, armour on or not.

“You knew this conversation was coming,” he says, turning at last to face him. “But let’s save it for a more appropriate time.”

“I’ll tell you something right now, _Captain Rogers_ ,” Tony says, stepping right into him, “or whatever you’re calling yourself now you’re the new Nick Fury. There will _never_ be an appropriate time to tell me that you’re taking what is rightfully mine.”

“Oh, _now_ you’re all for civil rights?” Steve sneers, and like that they’re off, rehashing the same old tired argument they’d had a million times during the Civil War, before Steve was stuck bouncing back and forth in the time stream, before Tony wiped out years of his own memory rather than live with it but still claimed he’d do it all again. They never, ever learn, and Steve is just plain tired of it.

Apparently Thor is too. “If you two are here on my behalf,” he interrupts, “please feel free to take your leave.”

That brings them both to heel like the snapping junkyard dogs they are, and Steve can tell from the dejected slump of Tony’s armoured shoulders that he’s as ashamed as he is. They follow Thor in silence to the shattered ruins of Heimdall’s observatory, ground zero for the first attack. It makes sense to Steve’s trained eye – nothing in and nothing out once the assault began.

“I worry what will happen to the Realms with the Rainbow Bridge gone,” Thor says.

Steve nods. “Do you think we should seal the portal from this end?”

Tony scans the area and sighs. “I can’t get a good read,” he says. “It doesn’t help that I’m wearing armour from ten designs ago.”

Steve can’t help a small smile, though he swallows it quickly, not wanting to start another fight. He still has a soft spot for the suit Tony’s wearing, the height of cutting edge technology when he’d first seen it, a miracle of the modern age, now a museum piece in its owner’s eyes, useful only because it was too archaic for his compromised mainframe to interface with.

It reminds Steve of a simpler time, and never let it be said he’s still pining for the 1940s; if he had a choice now it’s ten years ago he misses most, when he and Tony were young, and full of hope combined with the joy of doing good work and having fun at the same time, and thought nothing could ever come between them.

“Wait! Don’t touch that!” Tony says, and whether he was talking to Steve or Thor they’ll never know, because the world is spinning and bright colours are flashing across his eyes, and then he’s hitting the ground, hard, and there’s nothing but black.

* * *

When he comes to he’s lying on his back in what looks like a forest, staring up at an inky sky, one brilliantly lit by two moons. It’s a long time since he’s toured the Realms with Thor, and he can’t immediately tell where he is, though it feels like a balmy spring evening, too warm for Jotunheim, too cool for Muspellheim. Vanaheim or Alfheim or Svartalfheim, then. He hopes for the first, and knows, with his luck, it’ll be the last. He’d better find the others then, before Tony challenges a dwarf to a smithing contest, forfeit: his head, or, God forbid, someone offers Thor condolences for Loki.

It’s not immediately clear, when he reaches a small town, whether he was right, but if he didn’t have bad luck he wouldn’t have any luck at all, so when he pushes open the doors of what appears to be a tavern, the raucous singing stops and every eye turns suspiciously to him. They don’t _look_ like Dark Elves; they don’t look like any race he recognises, so much as like something out of Lord of the Rings, which is about par for the course today.

In hindsight, introducing himself as an ally of Thor’s was possibly not the wisest decision he could have made, but it’s still a surprise when the orcs – goblins? – rise as one and shout, _“Eat him!”_ What follows is a cross between a bar brawl and a medieval melee, ducking arrows and sword strokes equally with fists and elbows. When he’s last man standing he strips one of the unconscious bodies of its chainmail and picks up a fallen shield.

Archaic as they are, he feels more himself than he did in fatigues and combat boots. He’ll always be a soldier in his heart, but it’s a long time since he’s worn camo, and while he knows he made the right decision leaving the shield and the uniform with Bucky, he misses them more than he can justly express. The one person who might truly understand is Tony, who’d always looked equal parts proud and melancholy when clips of Rhodey in the Iron Man armour played on the evening news, but they haven’t been able to speak civilly for long enough at a time to discuss anything like that.

And now Steve feels terrible for threatening to take it away again. He’d never really do it, he couldn’t, any more than he could permanently eject Tony from the Avengers. As often as the line-up’s changed over the years, as often as they’ve fallen out, as mad as they’ve gotten at each other, it’s never truly felt like the _team_ if they weren’t both in it together. Every time they go their separate ways one or other of them tracks the other down, and the other _always_ comes back.

He did it last, which makes it Tony’s turn, but the way’s he’s been acting lately it’s clear he’s not going to. Steve could be the bigger man, but he’s sick of taking the high road only for Tony to accuse him of planting his flag and using his position as Captain America to make everyone else take his part without even considering the alternative. Even _Loki_ regretted his actions in the end, but Tony never does, or if he does he never admits it, and Steve just wishes-

That line of thought is cut off when he’s set upon by another band of armed marauders. These ones he’s pretty sure are elves of some description – they’re wearing plate armour, and are generally better groomed as well as better looking – but they’re as much off their game as the others, and when they flee into the forest he’s left largely unscathed, though with a nasty sword cut to one biceps.

Against his better judgement, he accepts an elfwoman’s offer of treatment, and follows her into her small cottage. She’s tall and beautiful, and reminds him a little of Wanda, enough so that when he starts talking about the old days, and old regrets, sitting in front of the fire while she binds his arm, he doesn’t immediately realise that these are things he’d never say to a stranger, has seldom even said to a friend. It’s only when he realises that he’s talking about _Tony_ that he bites down hard on his tongue to stop the flow of words.

_“I love him, and I respect him, and I don’t know why I keep fighting with him. I stand my ground on principle, when all I want to do is-”_

He jerks his arm out of her grasp, demanding, “What have you done to me? Why am I pouring myself out like this?”

She smiles at him gently. “My sisters and I have the gift of empathy,” she says. “Don’t be ashamed of your true feelings though. They’re quite beautiful.”

“My true feelings?” he asks, annoyed and embarrassed. “That’s crazy.”

“Perhaps,” she agrees, getting up and putting her salves and bandages away. “That dressing will heal your wound quickly, if you sit still and calm and let it. But I don’t think you will.”

“I can’t,” he says. “I have to find my friends.”

“Of course.” She smiles at him, and she truly is beautiful. “You should bring him back here with you. It’d be good for you both.”

“I have to find Thor too,” he insists, annoyed at himself almost more than her for knowing immediately who she was talking about. As if he’s summoned it by wishing, the sky outside lights up brighter than daylight and a massive thunderclap sounds overhead.

“Then do your best to talk to him anyway,” she says, going to her tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek. “You’ll both be happier for it.”

* * *

Riding a horse borrowed from Mageth the elfwoman, and trying to follow the rapidly receding storm, Steve honestly thinks nothing further on this day of wonders can surprise him. That’s until Tony emerges from the gloom in front of him, running _buck naked_ through the forest, pursued by a _dragon_.

Slaying physical dragons has always been easier for Steve than battling metaphorical ones, so he does what he does best, shoving Tony behind him and flinging the shield at the dragon’s ravening maw, before drawing his sword and wading into the fray. A normal man might not have heard Tony’s barely breathed _“Steve Rogers”_ but Steve is anything but normal, and so is Tony, and, for better or worse, this has been their life for over a decade now.

When the dragon is unconscious at his feet, or, rather, the old man it’s turned into is – normal, what is normal, normal is for other people – Steve turns back to Tony.

“Boy, am I happy to see you, Steve,” he says, and the smile on his face is so genuine, genuine like it hasn’t been in what feels like forever, that it’s easy to believe he doesn’t just mean for ass-saving reasons. But speaking of asses…

“Why are you naked?” Steve asks, unable to help himself.

“It’s my new armour,” Tony says, completely deadpan. “It’s see-through. _Very_ high tech.”

“Jokes, really?” Steve asks, but he can feel his mouth twitching at the corners.

“I don’t know,” Tony says, suddenly looking serious again, and this time Steve has no difficulty telling he’s sad rather than angry. “Are you going to confiscate it? Because the ogres already took the old suit.”

“Ogres, what?” Steve demands, latching onto the part that’s easier to deal with.

As if on cue, a party of ogres armed with clubs and maces appears. Steve braces himself for his third battle of the day, but they take one look at the broadsword in each of his hands, or possibly just the look on his face, and drop their gear, a sack containing the armour along with it, the better to turn tail and disappear back into the trees as fast as they can run.

“You’d _better_ run,” Tony shouts after them. “What?” he demands, off Steve’s amused look. “They said my armour was _ugly_! And they called me a pink piglet. And they tied me to a table naked and started brandishing all sorts of medieval torture implements!”

Steve bursts out laughing, he just can’t help himself. Tony glares at him for a moment, but then he starts chuckling too.

“Which of those things hurt the most?” Steve asks, already knowing the answer, and sure enough, he’s able to chime in and echo Tony’s admission, _“The armour.”_

“I loved that armour,” Tony goes on, still grinning. “It was ahead of its time. It had roller skates!”

“Oh, I know,” Steve agrees. “They might even be useful if there was any, you know, pavement around here.”

Tony sighs. “I don’t see an AC adaptor or an outlet either, so it’s a _literal_ suit of armour now.”

“I’d say that’s all you need here,” Steve replies, “if today is anything to go by.” He stops smiling and looks Tony right in the eye for what feels like the first time in forever. “I loved that armour too,” he says sincerely.

“You were always a Luddite,” Tony says, but before Steve can get annoyed he goes on, “You’re right though. Things were so simple then. All I had to do was wait for you to shout _‘Assemble!’_ and then do the heavy lifting. Catch the buildings when they collapsed, ferry people out of harm’s way, zap the odd bad guy, and they were always in wacky outfits so I _knew who they were_.”

“You did a lot more than that!” Steve insists, shaken by how weary Tony sounds.

“I wasn’t there when it really counted, though,” Tony says hoarsely. “All those times I swooped in and grabbed you off whatever battlefield, and when you went down on those stairs, in the middle of New York, I had to _watch it on TV_.”

Steve’s heart lurches unpleasantly. “I thought you didn’t remember that.”

“There were a hundred television news crews there,” Tony says, voice cracking, “and probably a thousand iPhones. I’ve seen it from every angle, and in slow motion too.”

_“Tony.”_

“And as bad as I feel now, I know I must have felt worse then, because I didn’t know then _you’d come back_!” Tony swipes angrily at his eyes. “And don’t ask me how I know that, okay, I _know_. It’s hard enough now, _wanting_ to say things to you and not being able to. But at least I have _hope_. I might find the courage one day. You might calm down long enough to let me. I have a great imagination though, I can guess what it was like knowing for sure I’d _never_ get a chance.”

 _Oh_. Steve clenches his fists and takes a deep breath. Tony has always been braver than him, in some ways. Or more self-reflective. He didn’t need an elfwoman’s powers of empathy to bring him to this realisation.

“Tell me now,” he says.

_“What?”_

“You be brave, and I’ll be calm. But tell me now.”

Tony shifts awkwardly and looks anywhere but at Steve. Ten, twenty, thirty agonising seconds pass, and then he squares his shoulders, straightens up and looks right into Steve’s eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “For everything. All the things I said and did. I’m so, so sorry. I know that’s not enough, but I hope you’ll let me have the chance to earn your friendship back. I don’t deserve it, I just hope you’ll let me.”

“I’m sorry too,” Steve says. “Especially for what I said right before we came here. But for the other stuff too. And you’ll always be my friend. It’s hard to put away all the things that happened between us, but I want to try. Let’s try.”

The hug is completely spontaneous, both of them moving at the same time, arms wrapping round each other and cinching in tight. Tony rests his head on Steve’s shoulder and whispers, “I’m not half as good at _anything_ as I am when I’m doing it next to you. And that’s the truth.”

Steve holds him tighter at that, fingers spreading out to stroke his back. His _still naked_ back. Tony seems to notice at the exact same instant and jerks back.

“Well,” he says, moving belatedly to cover himself. “This is very awkward indeed. I can’t believe I made my big confession in the altogether. I should find the armour and put it back on.”

Steve laughs. He’s so happy right now that nothing could possibly be awkward. Besides, he’s seen it all before, a hundred times, in locker rooms and hospitals and once or twice when he’s walked in on Tony _in flagrante_.

“It serves you right for going commando under there,” he says, the echo of an old argument, but one they always had in much better spirits. “Doesn’t it chafe?”

Tony laughs too, though a trifle more nervously, as he empties the pieces of the armour out of their sack and starts sorting through them. “This is precision machinery,” he sniffs, playing along. “It’s very finely honed.”

Steve winks at him, delighted to be bantering like old times. “When did you ditch the thong?” he asks, just because he can.

Tony smirks back, and for a moment he’s almost entirely his old self. “Oh, you liked that?” he asks, devil may care like when they were young.

Steve swallows, thinking of red underwear and matinee idols and a lifetime of camaraderie and true confessions and the courage to take a chance. “Yeah,” he says, completely seriously. “I did. I always did.”

The kiss is just as spontaneous as the hug, but nowhere near as measured. It’s hello and goodbye in one; farewell to a status quo that has run its course and welcome to something new. Tony’s hands, nimble and strong from all the metalwork he’s done, clutch at Steve’s jaw, callused fingertips pressing firmly on the nape of his neck, thumbs stroking his temples. Steve’s own hands roam freely across his bare skin before settling on his shoulder blade and the small of his back.

There’s one moment of gentleness, a soft brush of lips, and then Tony is pulling, hard, tilting Steve’s head one way as he leans the other so that their mouths drag across each other and fit together. Steve’s opens, helpless under the onslaught, and Tony follows, his tongue dragging hot and wet over Steve’s lips before slipping inside. Steve pulls him in close, hands spread wide to hold him there, but Tony’s not going anywhere. He bites viciously at Steve’s jaw, and in response Steve presses his fingers in harder. Over Tony’s shoulder he can see the bruises already blooming around his fingertips, but when he tries to relax his grip Tony bites him again. They’re both going to be a wreck by the time they find Thor, and-

Steve pulls back reluctantly. “We really don’t have time for this,” he says, breathless. “We have to-”

“Find Thor, I know,” Tony agrees. He shakes his head. “You realise we’re probably going to have to fight the Battle of Pelennor Fields or something before we can get out of here.”

It's so great to be back on the same wavelength that Steve feels like he’ll never stop smiling. “It’ll be awesome,” he says, handing Tony one of his swords. “Suit up.”

It’s a tight squeeze, the two of them together on the one borrowed horse, but when Tony leans in and whispers in his ear, “Any excuse to get me to hold you,” Steve knows everything’s going to be okay.

“You see right through me.”


End file.
